51 pages • 1-hour read
Zia
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Chapters 8-14Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Content Warning: This section of the guide includes depictions of racism, death, and animal cruelty.
Chapter 8 Summary
Zia helps with cooking and tries to find Mando to discuss their escape from the ship. She hears they plan to take her and Mando to Boston and exhibit them to white citizens as “real Indians.” Zia feels determined to escape. She finds Mando stripped to the waist, boiling blubber. She only manages to talk to him after three days, when an accident happens to the mate. A commotion occurs after the mate fell into the whale’s skull while he was trying to cut it. They try to save him by cutting the whale’s skull but the liquid pours out, carrying the mate into the sea. He quickly disappears.
Chapter 9 Summary
Following the accident, the children find a chance to escape. Mando is now a cabin boy and says the captain will sail for Boston the next day. Zia is determined to flee, even by swimming, and go to the island. Mando says the island is too far and wonders what she would do there. Zia suspects that Mando is thinking about going to Boston. He admits he considered it. Zia emphasizes they are “captives of the white men” (59), but Mando does not share her feelings. Mando believes the captain will search for them by morning and is worried about what will happen. Zia is certain they will be far enough by then and emphasizes they are not enslaved to anyone. Despite having no oars, Zia believes the current will lead them to the shore. She emphasizes to Mando that they must find Karana and bring her home. The siblings agree to escape. Zia is unsure if Mando will follow her but is determined to make it to the shore.
Chapter 10 Summary
At night, Zia sneaks out behind the watchman and toward the deck. She finds Mando on the boat trying to cut the rope with his knife. The children pass by whale carcasses and into the sea, sailing toward the island. By morning, Mando reminds Zia they will soon discover the boat is missing. She suggests they break the rudder and use the pieces as paddles, sailing toward Mission Ventura. Zia notices that Mando is “torn between the shore and the ship” (67). He says he has nothing to do in the Mission except work in the fields. Zia reminds him that he was still a laborer on the ship.
Approaching the shore, the siblings fall into the current and jump into the water before the boat hits a rock. On the beach, they find other Indigenous people who help them. The Island Girl is later washed ashore. The next morning, Captain Nidever meets them and says he will go to the island soon to hunt sea otters. Zia asks him to take her on the trip. The captain will consider it.
Chapter 11 Summary
Zia visits Captain Nidever every week during the summer in the Chumash village, asking about the trip. She suggests she can weave a sail herself for his canoes. The captain says he needs it by September and Zia agrees. She asks him about the footprints he saw on the island. The captain speculates that whoever is on the island is scared of white men. Zia asks Captain Nidever to at least take one of the fathers from the Mission if he does not want her on the trip. She suggests Father Vicente, assuring him that he is a brave man.
Chapter 12 Summary
Zia starts weaving the sail, thinking she would want to make the trip to the island alone. Even though she does not know Karana, she has a deep love for her. During the week, she spends extra time working around the Mission. Later, she visits Captain Nidever along with Father Vicente. The father says he cannot hunt otters but can row well. Captain Nidever says that the footsteps might belong to someone other than Karana and warns him that the voyage will be hard. However, he admits that Father Vicente would help them find her soon. Father Vicente is ready to go anytime. Zia always loved him and wonders why he is willing to risk his life for her. Father Vicente explains that her aunt must be lonely. Zia tells Captain Nidever she wants to join them, but the captain says there is little room in the boat. Zia realizes he would never have taken her with him.
Chapter 13 Summary
Everyone at the Mission helps Father Vicente prepare for the trip. The morning Captain Nidever arrives to take him, everyone gathers on the beach. Zia watches the boat until it disappears. She hears Gito Cruz, an Indigenous man who works in the Mission, explaining that the boat disappeared because the world is round like an orange. Zia does not understand.
Zia returns to the Mission and goes to the chapel to pray for Father Vicente, wishing he would find Karana. After a hard day’s work, Zia climbs to the belfry to look toward the island. At night, she is troubled by thoughts that Karana might not like Mission life. She feels unhappy and remains sleepless.
Chapter 14 Summary
Spring is the time for planting melons, and the Indigenous girls in the Mission must help in the fields under the hot sun. Gito, who was the chieftain of the Indigenous people in the Mission, approaches Zia and her friends, saying he dislikes the idea of young girls working in the fields. Gito Cruz was from a small tribe north of the Mission and was the chief’s son. He always complained about Mission life. He tells the girls that the priests make everyone work hard and deprive them of freedom. Gito also speaks with other workers.
Indigenous people in the Mission admire and fear Gito. His real name is Stone Hands, and he is considered by the people “an enemy of the white man” (90). Stone Hands says that the first Mission was built in San Diego by Indigenous tribes who were forced to work. But they were tired and ultimately set fire to the building and returned home. He says that they cannot burn the Mission, but they can leave. Zia realizes he is serious. He suggests that after the Sunday fiesta, they can quietly gather, take food, and go North. Zia notices that some people hesitate. To convince them, Stone Hands talks about white people’s false promises and land theft. Everyone says they feel “like slaves” as they are forced to do unpaid labor. Zia feels otherwise. Despite the hard work, she feels the fathers love them and genuinely want them to know God.
Stone Hands gives Zia a spare key, saying it can unlock all doors. She agrees to hide it. The next morning, Zia climbs on the belfry to see if Captain Nidever’s boat is returning but sees nothing. Later, during Father Merced's preaching, everyone thinks about Stone Hand’s words.
Chapters 8-14 Analysis
In this section, O’Dell explores the impact of Colonial Injustice Against Indigenous Peoples by detailing Zia and Mando’s experiences on the ship. As the white men of the whaler force the children into unpaid labor. Zia spends every day working in the kitchen while Mando boils blubber, which makes it difficult to communicate, highlighting isolation as a key strategy in subjugation. Instead of breaking Zia’s spirit, this oppression reinforces her determination to reclaim her freedom, but Mando takes a more pragmatic view of their circumstances, envisioning possibilities outside of the Mission system. O’Dell uses this conflict to illustrate different perspectives and viewpoints within the Indigenous community, highlighting the complexity of the postcolonial experience. Mando believes that the ship will allow him to explore opportunities for himself in Boston, while Zia insists that on the boat they remain “captives of the white men,” pointing to the repercussions of colonial oppression (59). Despite his hesitation, Mando follows Zia, and they escape the ship.
Zia’s single-minded focus on finding Karana exemplifies The Struggle for Cultural Preservation and Survival. Zia feels “great love” for her aunt even though she has never met her, underscoring her longing for a connection to her family and homeland. Zia’s admission that her goal is partly selfish and her “strange thought” that Karana might be miserable at the Mission, disconnected from her home and traditional way of life, reflects Zia’s character growth as she develops greater self-awareness and a more nuanced perspective on the world. She notes that under the Mission system, “She would have to live as I lived and all the Indians lived, in the way the Father Superior wanted us to” (85). Although finding Karana signifies the struggle to preserve Indigenous heritage, Zia suspects that her aunt’s arrival at the Mission may alienate her from all she knows and loves, complicating Zia’s quest to reconnect to her ancestral past through Karana.
Through Stone Hands, O’Dell represents historical accounts of Indigenous Resistance to Colonial Oppression. Stone Hands organizes what was historically known as an “uprising”—Indigenous peoples’ coordinated and collective attempts to emancipate themselves from colonial systems and return to their homeland. In O’Dell’s novel, Stone Hands galvanizes the Indigenous community against the Mission, energizing its political consciousness. O’Dell reproduces the trope of the stoic Indigenous male in Stone Hands, describing him as a man who “had fists like stones and a heart that I think was stone too” (90). However, Stone Hands’s agency as a community organizer remains important and underscores the historical elements of O’Dell’s narrative. In his speeches, Stone Hands emphasizes that most Missions are built by Indigenous people and depend on their unpaid labor, suggesting that any resistance disrupts the Mission’s power structure and ability to function. Although Zia is suspicious of his intentions, Stone Hands’s character illustrates the historical injustices against Indigenous communities and their attempts at resistance.
Zia’s relationship with Stone Hands evidences her growing understanding of the systems of oppression in which the Mission is complicit. Despite her appreciation for individual priests’ goodwill and her hesitation to leave her life at the Mission herself, she prioritizes solidarity and connection to her community. After Stone Hands lays out his plan for the people’s escape from the Mission, Zia agrees to hide the key that unlocks the doors, risking her safety. Although she remains at the Mission, fixated on Karana’s return, Zia exercises agency in a collective act of defiance and resistance that is key to her character growth and lays the groundwork for the story’s resolution.
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